New research from RCSI University of Medicine and Health Sciences examines the characteristics of digital tools used to promote physical activity in people with long-term health conditions.

The findings have been published in Digital Health. They indicate that, as digital tools have become increasingly popular in the last decade, it is important to establish whether they are better than traditional care for managing certain heath issues. The study also focused on understanding people’s level of ability to use these tools.

Long-term condition (LTC) refers to a range of physical and mental health conditions lasting for more than one year that cannot at present be cured but can be controlled with medication or therapies.

Physical activity can help with the management of LTCs, but insufficient amounts of this kind of activity is a major global health challenge. Digital tools have become commonplace over the last decade and offer significant potential to support people to be active.

In this study, the researchers conducted an independent scoping review of existing research literature and described the body of published evidence as a first step to establish effectiveness in a future review.

Professor Suzanne McDonough, Head of the RCSI School of Physiotherapy and lead author on the study, described the approach: "We carried out a very broad search of all literature published over a decade, from 2009 to 2019, to find studies that looked at the use of digital tools to help people with one or more LTCs to remain physically active. We wanted to know if the tools were designed to manage multiple conditions that a person has, what type of people were included in the studies, and exactly how the digital tool was delivered to people. A strength of our review was that we scoped across 18 different LTCs and, unlike previous reviews, we identified a wealth of studies."

The most common digital tools identified were websites, which were often linked to a wearable device such as Fitbit or Apple Watch. In most cases a healthcare professional facilitated the person to use the digital tool to set goals and to monitor their physical activity.

The majority of the literature compared a digital tool to something else, e.g. traditional care, in people with conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and obesity. Although people in these studies often had other health conditions, the study found that the digital tools were designed to treat the patient’s main health problem only, and were not being targeted at older adults (aged over 65).

"The scoping review methods we used in this review don’t enable us to say at this point whether the digital tools we identified are better than traditional care, but it was notable that the studies in the review are not representative of the largest proportion of people with LTCs – older adults and those with multiple health conditions. It is also unclear what people’s experiences are of using digital tools, which is really important to understand for long-term engagement," Professor McDonough said.

"Given it is likely that there is overlap in approaches across conditions, it is important to draw this evidence together to inform future directions in this important area for health. We currently have a review underway to find out the effectiveness of these digital tools."

The study was a collaboration between researchers in Ireland and the UK and was funded by RCSI and the National Institute for Health Research Wessex Applied Research Collaboration.